Read About How Wierd You Are

Was pointed to this article today by The Phantom Professor.

Read it and let me know if this is talking about you (or some of your friends).

A sample from the article:

Respect is something that Cupertino, Calif., high school teacher Arcadia Conrad has thought a lot about. At 33, she is not so far removed in age from her students, but she's eons away in attitude.

As an interviewer of prospective college students for Vassar, her alma mater, Conrad recalls a student showing up in "flip-flops and a miniskirt and her hair still wet."

"I'm one of the people making college decisions," she says. "I told her she was not on her way to the beach: 'Couldn't you have dried your hair?' "

Conrad, who teaches English and theater arts, says she often has to remind students who work as ushers or at concessions for school performances that listening to an iPod or talking with their friends on the job isn't appropriate.

"They seem to have a lot of trouble with the concept of putting your best foot forward," she says.

But technology and the way the young relate to it are creating the most adult consternation, Verhaagen says. He cites as an example a high school senior from an exclusive private school who was an intern at his office and spent a staff meeting text-messaging friends.

He didn't intend to be rude, but "he was clearly not tuned in to the fact that our expectations and cultural mores were different. If you grow up in a culture that says it's all about you, it's hard to think it isn't."

"I don't think we're requiring civic responsibility anymore — the social graces, ceremony and ritual, dress codes, social mores and manners," she says. "My students seem to be saying, 'I can separate myself from whatever experience I'm in and create my own bubble.' "